Johnson rarely makes mistakes as his execution when on the track is near flawless. And he may be at his best when having to try and recover from a mistake. An example of that came at Atlanta Motor Speedway on Oct. 26.

Johnson had started from the pole but lost that advantage when he was penalized for speeding on the entrance to pit road on lap 89. The penalty put him a lap down and in 30th position. He drove hard to get back five spots and then a caution came. His crew responded by giving him a lightning-fast pit stop that gained him another five spots to 20th. He eventually got in position to regain the lead lap. Then late in the race Knaus brought Johnson to the pits, giving up four spots to take four tires. It was move that paid off as Johnson stormed his way to a runner-up finish. Once again Johnson and Knaus had worked their magic.

Both driver and crew chief are smart at what they do and when they do make a mistake, they learn from it. That’s why their mistakes are few and far between. They keep pouring more and more into their collective knowledge box and that just improves their chances at winning races.

Johnson is served well by his mental and emotional outlook on racing. He’s not going to bust out verbally when things aren’t working out for him. That’s not his way and he knows doing that doesn’t work for him. It doesn’t help his racing. He responds to adversity by being able to think things through and work with what comes from that. Are there times that he is just as upset as some of the other drivers with more fiery temperaments? Absolutely there are, but he’s able to harness that emotion and not let it detract from his racing. He knows when to verbalize and when to keep quiet.

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Both Johnson and Knaus have great passion for the sport so it’s likely they will at least match the four championships won by Gordon. That might even be a modest goal for them because there really isn’t any reason to think more titles won’t follow sooner rather than later since Johnson, Knaus and the No. 48 team have proven they can not only sustain competing at an elite level, they can even improve upon it.